There seems to be a trend of self-diagnosis. People run to claim they have some sort of mental issue. You’re not just sad, you’re depressed. You aren’t just stressed, you have high anxiety. You don’t just have trouble concentrating, you have ADD.

I think the draw of claiming to have something wrong is the supposed lack of accountability. “It’s not my fault, you see. It’s my disorder.” One of the symptoms of depression is lack of interest in things that you once found enjoyable. Ergo, depression makes you not want to do things, so when there is a thing you don’t want to do, pin it on your depression. Problem solved!

But for those who suffer from depression, it isn’t laziness. It’s vehement disinterest.

I have all three of those things: depression, anxiety, and ADHD. All of them prohibit me from dealing with society on a basic level. Usually I don’t have the motivation to deal with the world, and when I do, I panic about every minute detail, to the point where it drives me to distraction. I don’t get things done. Even necessary things, like making appointments or placing an order. I much prefer to sit under my rock and not do anything. It’s what I have the energy for.

When you have depression, it is very, very easy for your life to fall apart when you have depression, because very, very quickly, you stop caring. I have twelve dollars in my bank account and a very strained relationship with just about every person I know. And I sort of don’t care. Scratch that—I entirely don’t care. I should. And believe me, I would like to. But I don’t. Because caring takes prolonged bouts of energy.

Everything takes energy. That’s the thing that I’ve discovered. Even being interested in something takes energy. I sit, blandly, trying to find something to distract myself from the nothing, and… there’s nothing. Movies, books, sports: they happen, but I have no reaction. They are there. I don’t care. I don’t care that I don’t care. I don’t care that I don’t care that I don’t care. Round and round and round, further and further in on myself, all going nowhere.

It’s cyclical.

At the start, I was sad. I was sad that I was sad. I wanted to be happy again, but I couldn’t figure out how to be. Slowly, the yearn to be happy again melted away into the void where all of my other emotions went. I was sad, but I didn’t care. Then I stopped being sad. I wasn’t interested enough to be sad. I simply was. It’s an easy place to settle into, just existing. But even that takes energy.

I’m tired. Going through the motions is tiresome, even moreso when you’re running on fumes. Which is what it feels like all of the time. Fourteen hours of sleep, and I still have nothing in the tank. But every other option–both the good and the bad–takes more energy than this, so I stick with this, my path of least resistance, on and on and on, until it stops.

The problem is, it never feels like it’s going to. Because really, it isn’t. It’s always going to be there. The medication and the therapy and the talking keep it at bay, but as proven by my current state, it can and will seep back in. It’s a slow takeover, one I didn’t notice until it was too late. It’s here now.